A new CBO report out on the cost of Obamacare shows that the president's signature legislation that he said would cost around $900 billion over 10 years will actually cost nearly twice that - $1.7 trillion over the period from 2013-2022.

Washington Examiner:

President Obama's national health care law will cost $1.76 trillion over a decade, according to a new projection released today by the Congressional Budget Office, rather than the $940 billion forecast when it was signed into law.

Democrats employed many accounting tricks when they were pushing through the national health care legislation, the most egregious of which was to delay full implementation of the law until 2014, so it would appear cheaper under the CBO's standard ten-year budget window and, at least on paper, meet Obama's pledge that the legislation would cost "around $900 billion over 10 years." When the final CBO score came out before passage, critics noted that the true 10 year cost would be far higher than advertised once projections accounted for full implementation.

Today, the CBO released new projections from 2013 extending through 2022, and the results are as critics expected: the ten-year cost of the law's core provisions to expand health insurance coverage has now ballooned to $1.76 trillion. That's because we now have estimates for Obamacare's first nine years of full implementation, rather than the mere six when it was signed into law. Only next year will we get a true ten-year cost estimate, if the law isn't overturned by the Supreme Court or repealed by then. Given that in 2022, the last year available, the gross cost of the coverage expansions are $265 billion, we're likely looking at about $2 trillion over the first decade, or more than double what Obama advertised.

The legislation is already opposed by a majority of Americans. But perhaps the GOP could remind voters what Obama said about it at the time during a speech before a joint session of congress:

Now, add it all up, and the plan I'm proposing will cost around $900 billion over 10 years -- less than we have spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and less than the tax cuts for the wealthiest few Americans that Congress passed at the beginning of the previous administration.  (Applause.)  Now, most of these costs will be paid for with money already being spent -- but spent badly -- in the existing health care system.  The plan will not add to our deficit.  The middle class will realize greater security, not higher taxes.  And if we are able to slow the growth of health care costs by just one-tenth of 1 percent each year -- one-tenth of 1 percent -- it will actually reduce the deficit by $4 trillion over the long term.

Being wrong is not the same as lying. Obama wasn't wrong. He knew the funny numbers his administration was putting out. He knew the accounting tricks the Democrats were playing. He knew it all. And he looked the American people in the eye and lied to them.

This will almost certainly turn out to be one of the most expensive lies ever told.

Hat Tip: Ed Lasky